I had some arguments with a loved one and am really abusing myself over it mentally.  The problem is that I’m trying so hard to be justified in my behavior, but I know that I won’t be happy trying to get my way.  My way is seldom the right way.

Changing my behavior and my old ways of thinking is very difficult for me at times and especially today.  I want to be selfless and not be concerned with myself, as I’ve stated many times before, but it just doesn’t come that easily.  I get tired of having feelings of self-pity, and this worn-down feeling only adds more weight to my self-pity.  For some reason it is taking me longer to process these feelings than it has in the recent past and I’m experiencing moments of apathy.  I’ve noticed that it’s during these times of internal struggle that I realize the progress that I’ve made, but rather than valuing the progress I see it all as failed efforts.   That’s where my thinking needs to change.  When I see the progress, I MUST value it.  It’s amazing and scary to me how quickly my negativity “switch” can be flicked on.

Today I’m picturing myself climbing out of the deep dark hole of addiction, anxiety, and depression.  The next rung on the ladder is broken.  Rather than grabbing that rung and falling back into the hole, I will stretch myself to reach the next rung above and continue my ascent out of the dark and into the light.

Formula for Progression

“Learn from the past.  Prepare for the future.  Live in the present.”

– Thomas S. Monson

Out of my Control

I became overwhelmed with finances after figuring out how much I was spending on gas each month.  This thought then turned into a race of thoughts surrounding all my fears regarding finances and economic instability.  I began to get consumed with anger and felt that emotion quickly take control of my thoughts, words, and demeanor.

I felt the power of this emotion and tried my hardest to accept it and re-engage with life.  After struggling with these thoughts and emotions I remembered that it was ok to feel that way.  Rather than try to run from those feelings and find a quick reprieve I needed to let my feelings and emotions run their course.  I’m sure I’m not the only human upset about gas prices and worried about financial security.  Therefore, it’s quite natural to feel what I felt.  Why should I run from it?

My test is to learn how to not let these emotions effect how I interact with others and how I think about myself.  Gas prices are out of my control.  They have nothing to do with the person I am.  I can choose to take action against the situation, or I can choose to let the situation take control of me.  I’ve chosen to ask God how to take action against this and to help me learn how to handle these emotions when I feel them in the presence of others.  I see this as another opportunity he is giving me to turn my weaknesses into strengths.  Another opportunity to stretch myself, rather than shrink.

Promises

Yesterday I realized I had received from God something that I have been asking for, for quite sometime. I had the desire to help someone else in need, and I acted upon it. For so long I have been consumed with how to make myself better and worrying about what’s wrong with me. I was told that as I learn to help and serve others, I will forget myself and, in turn, my problems. I was also reassured that my problems would no longer exist. The key always being to ask God to show me how to accomplish this.

This is more proof to me that my sanity is directly tied to my spirituality. In rehab, I was promised to see many things change for the better in my life if I agreed to turn my will over to God and add consistent structure to my life. As I strive to make progress and channel my thoughts through God, the promises continue to surface in front of me.

The Promises:

“We are going to know a new freedom and a new happiness. We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it. We will comprehend the word serenity and we will know peace. No matter how far down the scale we have gone, we will see how our experience can benefit others. That feeling of uselessness and self-pity will disappear. We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us. We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us. We will suddenly realize that God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves.

Are these extravagant promises? We think not. They are being fulfilled among us — sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. They will always materialize if we work for them.”

Into Action

“You can sit about in a vacuum–whether this be the privacy of your room, or an academic classroom, or a pulpit–and discuss the truth of a theory forever, and it may do you no good.  It is when you let truth go into action, and hurl your life after your held conception of truth, that things start to happen.  If it is genuine truth, it will accomplish things on a plane of actual living.”

– Samuel M. Shoemaker

Making Amends

Yesterday I had to make the decision to accept heartache.  Because of my past actions I have hurt people whom I love the most, and it is now their time to let their emotions run their course.  I must not allow myself to take their pain personally, and I must not allow myself to get in the way of their feelings.

While I am part of the cause of their pain, I have cleaned my side of the street.  I have been honest in confessing my past and expressing regret.  Now I give them to God.  I ask God to give everything I want for myself to be given to them.  I ask God to give them health, prosperity, and happiness.  That is all I can do.

For far to long I have been trying to control and arrange everything around me in my own cunning ways and I have never received what I’ve been trying to grasp.  I’ve found great relief in handing all things over to God.  He knows how to run the show and he knows how it will end.  He can take my past mistakes and the people I’ve harmed and deal with them in his way.  The key is that he does take them, and I don’t hold on to them any more.

I find continual peace in reciting the Serenity Prayer and remembering how it applies to me.  It reminds me that there are things (people, places, institutions, events, etc.) outside of myself that I cannot control, and that accepting this reality will provide me peace.  It reminds me that I am most capable of changing my defects of character with the help of God.  And it reassures me that God will help me see the fine line between these two extremes.

“God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.”

–Reinhold Niebuhr